It's one thing to break a leg during a theatrical performance, it's quite another to have it gnawed off by limpy, discolored zombies running amok in Anytown, USA.
Yet that is what awaits Reginald Andre Jackson, a veteran Seattle actor who plays Ben, the hero of "Night of the Living Dead," a ghoulish stage presentation written by Lori Allen Ohm, directed by Linda Hartzell and based on the movie by George Romero and John Russo.
Allen Ohm's version of NOLD isn't for children, but teenagers 13 and up are welcome. Like the movie, whose unintentional documentary look contributes mightily to its creep-factor, the play will be full of stiff dialog, a lifelike set and throngs of zombies dressed to, ah, kill. But Ohm put the fun in funeral by camping up dialog. Jackson is all for it.
"We want the audience to laugh at what's going on and if we did it straight, with the stilted dialog, people would laugh anyway," Jackson said. "So why not give them permission to laugh."
Jackson plays the story's hero, Ben, who stumbles into a home near a graveyard and finds an already freaked out Barbara (Sarah Harlett) inside. Together they and some newcomers spend the rest of the story beating back hordes of undead (haven't we all been there at one time or another?). No word yet if there will be a Michael Jackson-esque zombie dance in the hour-plus one act, but since it's camp, it wouldn't be surprising.
Jackson also pointed out some physical fun they'll have with the story. His character, for example, asks the near catatonic Barbara to fetch him some wood so he can board up the windows. She comes back with little useless twigs. "She's totally out of it," Jackson said smiling.
There's also a moment that Jackson describes as Bill Nye meets Monty Python in which scientists explain through video and more, exactly why there are dead people walking the streets and why they've got a hankerin' for human brains.
There could also be some zombie-audience interaction.
"There are potential moments where zombies come down off the stage and the audience has to deal with them," Jackson said laughing.
Jackson, a veteran actor who lately has been spending time adapting the novels of Christopher Paul Curtis for the stage, also takes seriously the role of Ben, made famous by Duane Jones in the 1968 film. Having an African American as the lead in a film at the time was a big social statement by the film's writers Romero and Russo, Jackson said. Having Jones star in the film, he added, did certain things to the story, to make social commentary in certain places.
"In 1968 it was a new thing, so my feeling was to recast that a little," Jackson said. "If I played (Ben) without any racial overtones, it would lose the impact it had 40 years ago."
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